“We live in America, and we have the Second Amendment, and we have the Supreme Court of the United States telling everybody they can carry a gun wherever they want. This is what we have to live with.”
It feels like an inflection point in the balance between the right to bear arms and the right to, well, do just about anything else. The triumph of guns is throttling American public life, chipping away at our experience of school, shopping, protest, celebration, debate, electoral politics, and even the writing of laws.
You’d be hard-pressed to find an institution in this country that isn’t buckling under the weight of a gun fetish that has seen domestic firearms production triple since 2000 and a steady rise in mass shootings, as right-wing courts and state legislatures repeal rules and politicians and gunmakers stoke fears of tyranny and civil war. America now has more guns than people, according to one estimate.
Allow me to quote myself from 5 years ago:
It's a little-acknowledged fact that the second amendment, as currently interpreted, does much more than give people the right to 'bear arms'. Everyone knows that it allows people to own and use guns. That's what the text of the amendment talks about, after all. But owning and bearing are what gun owners do, and most Americans are not gun owners. But, the second amendment's range far exceeds simple gun ownership. The second amendment's greatest effect is to require that the possibility of gunfire is present in every situation in the US. It ensures that every situation you, gun owner or not, can find yourself in contains a non-zero chance that you will be shot to death - not the certainty, just the chance.
...
In fact, the requirement that being shot at, or being shot, or being killed by gunfire is possible in every situation is, to them, a fundamental and defining feature of the US itself. They insist that without it, we, or least they, would be diminished.
We hold this truth to be self-evident: that all men have the right to be a possible casualty of gunfire, goddamnit.
Let’s require, we already do, loaded weapons on both sides during every transaction in America … renter/landlord, musician/fan, employer/employee, Uber driver/Uber passenger, exit interviewer/exit interviewee, airline employee/passenger, judge/defendant, bartender/customer, insurance adjustor/insured client, financial planner/client, teacher/student, teacher/parent, parent/ child, cop/everyone, Lindsay Graham/me, man/woman, pedestrian/driver, Beatle/Beatle stalker, batter/pitcher, batter pitcher/umpire, hunter/game, Texan/American, drummer/bass player, priest/choirboy, rod dreher/his wife and rupaul, Bannon/Manson, Meter Maid/Libertarian Parker, musk/ his mother, muppet/ muppeteer ….
Ready, Get Set, Fire!
Yes! That’s the spirit!
I don’t want to play any gigs with armed bass players. Just saying.
I did work with one band where the trumpet player would bring his shotgun to rehearsal. He didn’t want to leave it in the car. This was the very late 90’s, and his paranoia around the imminent year 2000 technology catastrophe earned him the nickname “Y2K”.
Some people are just batshit insane.
As far as the 2A, if you’re not in a militia that operates under civil authority per the mandates of Congress, it doesn’t apply to you. As far as I can tell, anyway. Closest thing we have to that are the various state level guards, so if you want to join your state guard, you can keep and bear whatever weapon they issue to you, according to whatever rules they require you to follow regarding its use and handling.
Old man yells at clouds, that’s me.
Yellin at that same cloud.
Clouds yell at me.
i’ve had nights like that. but not in many years.
There’s a song title.
russell: I don’t want to play any gigs with armed bass players. Just saying.
This reminds me of a story Leonard Cohen told about working with Phil Spector. He implied that the whole experience was very volatile, and that Phil Spector often had guns around, but said that on one occasion Spector actually pulled a gun on him, while saying “I love you, Leonard”. To which he said he replied:
“I hope so, Phiil.”